Last Days of the Coq D'Or

A tale from the Cold War in Australia.When Alexander Pushkin adapted "The Golden Cockerel" from Washington Irving's "Tales of the Alhambra" to satirise an indolent Tsar, he could hardly have imagined that this cautionary tale would be transformed into an opera by Rimsky Korsakov, from an opera to a ballet by Michel Fokine, and that the ballet would travel to the other side of the globe and its scenario be depicted on the walls of a restaurant in Sydney.

Transcript

Australian artist Elaine Haxton would undoubtedly have seen the ballet, with its original scenery and costumes by Nathalie Goncharova. She was commissioned by the well-known Sydney restaurateur Walter Magnus to paint scenes from "Le Coq D'Or", as it became known outside Russia, to decorate the walls of his restaurant of the same name established in Ash Street, Sydney, in 1942.

The "Le Coq D'Or" restaurant was sold by Magnus to Francisco Tunica y Casas and his wife Jeanne in 1947. Jeanne and Francisco Tunica y Casas ran the restaurant until 1951, when the lease for the premises ran out and was not renewed by the owners, The National Club. The Tunicas were required to leave Australia by the Department of Immigration because of their association with known communists here in Sydney and on account of their previous activities in New Caledonia, where Madame Tunica had been the founding member of The Friends of the USSR, later to become the New Caledonian Communist Party. In helping the Kanaks as well as the indentured labourers from Vietnam and China stand up for their rights, Mme. Tunica ran foul of the establishment and with the Nickel Mining concerns. When their house in Noumea was bombed in 1946 the Tunicas, with their adopted son Richard, came to Australia. Richard was sent to Newington College and the Tunicas ran their restaurant in Ash Street, Sydney, below the headquarters of the NSW Liberal Party. They were increasingly under the scrutiny of the ASIO, and their presence in Australia was brought to the attention of Federal Parliament by Jack Lang. The family tried to return to France, but were prevented from doing so by the French Government. They finally settled in the New Hebrides. Richard Tunica completed his schooling here in Australia, obtained his naturalisation papers and married.